Ireland must prepare itself for the ‘big flood’

The tragic scenes we all witnessed over the past couple of weeks in Carlingford, Newry, Midleton, Rosslare and elsewhere remind us that floods constitute the greatest hazard associated with global climate change for an Ireland at the mercy of what happens around us in the Atlantic Ocean.

By the end of October, many parts of Ireland had already exceeded their annual average rainfall receipt, despite the fact that two of the normally wettest months of the year lay ahead. Indeed, for several locations on the south and east coasts, the last two months alone have provided 40 per cent of their 2023 total thus far.

A sequence of rain-bearing Atlantic depressions in late autumn/early winter is not that unusual a feature of Irish climate. Flood-producing events in 2002, 2009, 2011 and, of course, Storm Ophelia in 2017, were all October/November events aided by warm Atlantic waters. Recent Storms Agnes, Babet and Ciarán likewise formed over a warmer than usual Atlantic. Babet followed an even more warming-enhanced track from south to north, enabling it to accumulate copious amounts of moisture as it crossed the warm Bay of Biscay. In all cases, the rainfall amounts were influenced strongly by the characteristics of the high-altitude jetstreams, either blocking their progress to the east (in the case of Babet) or helping to rapidly deepen them as they approached (Ciarán).

Protecting homes and businesses against an increasing future flood risk will impose a heavy burden on Irish taxpayers

The atmosphere can hold 7 per cent more water for every degree rise in temperature. Not surprisingly, therefore, Ireland’s rainfall has increased by 7 per cent over the last 30 years, during which its temperature has increased by about 0.7 degrees when compared to the 1961-1990 period.

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A similar warming is projected by climate models for the next 30-year period, so we can expect rainfall extremes to further increase. This is not a surprise. A small increase in average conditions produces a disproportionately large change in the extremes of rainfall. I led the first project to use downscaled climate models to project runoff in Ireland some 20 years ago; the conclusion then (that as a result of increased rainfall, the magnitude and frequency of flood events would inevitably increase) is now being realised.

[ Storm Ciarán: Communities across Ireland brace for further flooding as storm arrives ]

[ Insurers know the answer to Irish flood cover problem ]

Protecting homes and businesses against an increasing future flood risk will impose a heavy burden on Irish taxpayers. While €1.3 billion has been committed to the delivery of flood-relief schemes over the period 2021-2030, it may not be enough to protect the approximately 23,000 properties in communities currently under threat from river and coastal flooding. The tragic consequences of an inability to insure against flood damage have become only too clear over recent weeks. It is also of concern that new areas, without a history of flooding, will become vulnerable.

But the capability of getting the necessary protection work done in time, as climate change marches on, is also an imperative for those potentially affected. A convenient scapegoat mentioned by politicians relates to delays in the planning process, and the implicit remedy is to further restrict public participation, such as is presently being proposed in the new Planning Bill.

This is to disingenuously oversimplify the causes of inaction. Bureaucratic inefficiencies are also at the heart of the matter. A planning application for flood relief in Midleton, for example, is scheduled to be lodged sometime in 2024. Central government also bears its share of blame. The Interdepartmental Flood Policy Co-ordination Group, chaired by the Office of Public Works, is a whole-of-government cross-sectoral group that has a remit to co-ordinate national flood policy development and implementation. One would imagine it would be highly active at the moment. But it typically meets twice a year and its last meeting was in April.

[ Almost 40 flood-hit businesses apply for emergency funding in wake of Storm Babet ]

[ ‘Unprecedented’ flooding hits several counties ahead of Storm Ciarán ]

Expensive, hard engineering solutions have a proven record of protecting communities in towns such as Clonmel, Bandon, Ennis, Clonakilty and Skibbereen. Such places would have been synonymous with flooding a decade or more ago, but no longer. It is too early to fully estimate the monetary cost of the recent flood events, but typically it runs at four times what protective measures would otherwise have cost.

Given that we are in a climate emergency however, other more radical options merit consideration. In the Netherlands, for example, a country facing even more acute problems of flooding than Ireland, a programme designed to work closer to nature has proven successful. “Room for the River” has sought to alleviate floods by better managing flood plains, creating water buffers and constructing flood bypasses. Working with nature rather than seeking to control it, offers opportunities. How much less expensive for the taxpayer would it be for example to pay agricultural landowners upstream to allow occasional flooding of their land that would protect homes and businesses downstream? It’s time to think outside the box.

Research has confirmed that record rainfall which caused deadly flooding across Germany and Belgium in July 2021 was made up to nine times more likely as a result of global heating. In an Ireland destined to get wetter and warmer, we must therefore accept some culpability if and when the really “big flood” happens. But what credibility will we have if we look to our friends in Europe to assist us in such circumstances? Can we expect sympathy or help from the European taxpayer when EU emissions have fallen by 31 per cent since 1990, while our emissions have increased by 25 per cent over the same period? Or will we be told, as one of the richest nations in Europe, that we must – perhaps literally – paddle our own canoe?

John Sweeney is emeritus professor of geography at Maynooth University